LONDON: The reported electoral alliance between Hamas, Islamic Jihad and exiled former Fatah strongman Mohammed Dahlan represents one of the most unlikely developments yet seen in Palestinian politics.
But as Palestinians prepare to go to the polls on Nov. 28, in the first national elections in 20 years, that extraordinary partnership could weaken President Mahmoud Abbas’s grip and, perhaps, even set the stage for a reboot of Palestinian hopes for self-determination.
Abbas, president of the Palestinian Authority, confirmed Nov. 28 as the date for elections to the Palestinian Legislative Council during his recorded address to the UN General Assembly on Sept. 24.
Not everyone is convinced the election will happen.
“I don’t believe that there will be an election,” said Kobi Michael, a senior researcher at Israel’s Institute for National Security Studies and the Misgav Institute.
“I believe that Abu Mazen will, at the right moment, find the right excuse why he must postpone the election.”
That has certainly happened before, most recently in 2021.
But if the election does go ahead, a strong electoral bloc featuring Dahlan and Hamas would likely be pushing at an open door.
An August poll carried out by the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research found that only 21 percent of Palestinians believed “Fatah under Abbas” was the party most deserving of leading the Palestinian people, while satisfaction with the president himself stood at only 26 percent in Gaza and 16 percent in the West Bank.
News of the “unlikely electoral coalition,” formed in a bid to end the 21-year presidential run of the 90-year-old Abbas, emerged this week in a rare interview with Mohammed Al-Hindi, deputy secretary-general of Islamic Jihad.
In an interview with The Associated Press in Istanbul on Monday, Al-Hindi said the alliance brought together “six or seven factions,” including Hamas, Islamic Jihad “and the Reformist Movement represented by Mohammad Dahlan … to support a unified national list.”
Islamic Jihad would not field any candidates, he added, because it did not consider the elections to be “beneficial to the national interest or the Palestinian people.”
But, he said, “it will support a national list … in order not to leave the stage for … other lists.”
There is no love lost between Dahlan and Abbas.
Appointed head of the Preventive Security Force in Gaza by Yasser Arafat following the Oslo Accords in 1994, Dahlan left the enclave after Hamas seized power there in 2007 but remained an influential Fatah leader until he and Abbas fell out spectacularly in 2011.
At the time, Dahlan was seen as a potential successor to Abbas. Amid accusations by Dahlan of corruption, and by Abbas of plotting to overthrow the Fatah leadership, Dahlan was expelled from the party and went into self-imposed exile in the UAE.
If Abbas considered Dahlan a political threat in 2011, 15 years later that threat has returned with a vengeance.
But it is Dahlan’s history with Hamas, and the close relationships he has cultivated in exile with the US, Israel and the UAE — America’s leading Gulf partner in the Abraham Accords — that make their new partnership such a remarkable exercise in realpolitik.
As head of the PSF in Gaza from 1994 to 2002, Dahlan became one of the Palestinian Authority’s most powerful security chiefs. He oversaw crackdowns on Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad and developed close working relationships with Israeli and US security and intelligence agencies in efforts to prevent militant attacks and uphold the Oslo security arrangements.
Today, Dahlan continues to play a key role in regional politics.
According to some reports, it was thanks to behind-the-scenes mediation by Dahlan that on July 30 President Donald Trump was able to announce “a historic agreement for the complete disarmament of Hamas and all other armed groups in Gaza.”
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu surprised Washington by rejecting Trump’s Gaza peace plan on Aug. 9 and implementation of the proposed disarmament agreement has since stalled.
But that it existed at all was thanks to Dahlan, according to Palestinian journalist Mohammed Daraghmeh, who last month told Le Monde that he had “mediated between Jared Kushner and Hamas.”
Dahlan, he added, “is emerging as the main Palestinian leader. Mahmoud Abbas remains invisible in his office while Mohammed Dahlan gets results.”
For Michael, a strategic alliance at this stage makes sense for both Dahlan and Hamas.
“Dahlan intends to replace Fatah and to begin paving his way back to the Palestinian territories, and I believe that he does it in order to be elected later as president,” Michael told Arab News.
“He is trying to build his political power by using his historical relations with Hamas, despite the crises they had when he was head of Preventive Security in the Gaza Strip.”
Although there might still be bad blood between them, “Hamas understands the political circumstances and they want to keep their relevance as a political power.”
Also, Dahlan, who was born in the Khan Younis refugee camp in Gaza, “grew up with them. He knows them and they know him, and they prefer him to the other people from Fatah.
“They know that they cannot participate in elections explicitly as Hamas, because they reject Mahmoud Abbas’ terms, and they do not intend to say that they accept the Oslo Agreement or recognize the right of the State of Israel to exist, and they want to keep their ideology.
“So, by cooperating with Dahlan and establishing the new national party, they will be able to be relevant players in the political arena.”
There is a “Game of Thrones” element to the relationship.
“I have no doubt that when Hamas feels strong enough politically, they will not hesitate to get rid of Dahlan,” Michael said.
